On 13th September 1914 the British
Army was advancing north from the Marne, with the intention of crossing the
Aisne. The Aisne was both a river and a canal, and at the village of Bourg, it
was intersected by the Oise-Aisne canal as well.

Before Bourg was 4th Dragoon Guards.
Here there were three bridges that crossed the two canals and the river, and
part of the Oise-Aisne canal ran over the Aisne river on an aqueduct. Advanced
patrols had spotted that the two canal bridges were intact, but that the road
bridge over the Aisne river had been blown. A plan was made to seize the two
canal bridges, and the aqueduct, which would allow a passage into Bourg itself.
The area seemed to be held by German infantry, supported by machine-guns at key
points on the bridges.

The commanding officer met with his
men on the south side of the Aisne canal and ordered a charge on the outposts
that guarded the first bridge. His men were already coming under fire from
Bourg, which sat on a high point, but the charge went in and took the Aisne
canal bridge quickly. A machine gun from a building on the other side of the
Aisne-Oise canal was laying down heavy fire, and the 4/DG were also taking
enfilade fire from a second gun on the aqueduct. At this point up rode Captain
Pat Fitzgerald, the Dragoon's machine gun officer, who dismounted his guns and
soon silenced the German fire. This enabled the infantry to move up, cross the
bridges and use the aqueduct to cross the river and enter Bourg.

It was at this point a shot ran out
from the church tower in Bourg;

Pat got a bullet between the
eyes. I was only a few yards from him, trying to do something for Sergeant
Langdon... when someone shouted to me. Fitzgerald was unconscious when I got
to him. His wound was no bigger than a blue pencil mark in the centre of his
forehead. Then in a moment he was gone.

Captain Gerald Hugh 'Pat' Fitzgerald
was born at Johnstown Castle, Wexford in April 1886, the only son of the late
Lord Maurice Fitzgerald. Educated at Eton, he was commissioned to the 4th
Dragoon Guards from the Yeomanry in December 1907, becoming Captain in November
1913. Pat had only married Dorothy Charrington on 6th August 1914, and had left
for the front almost at once. He and the other 4/DG casualties were buried in
the churchyard at Bourg, following the capture of the village.